They weren't even completely through the sad, plywood lobby and back out into the searing street -- where waves of heat were shimmering above the asphalt -- when Ryan turned to her and wordlessly held out his hand. She fumbled through her purse and came up with the crumpled pack of cigarettes, returning them without comment.
By the time they exited the building and crossed the street, Ryan had already lit up and was inhaling deeply, exhaling by blowing two furious plumes of smoke out of his nose. He looked like he was going to attempt to jump into the driver's seat, but she simply dangled the keys before him, and nudged him back around to the passenger side.
The inside of the car was broiling hot, the leather seats sticky and warm. She put down the windows at the same time she turned on the air-conditioning as high as it would go, and was hit with a blast of warm air.
"You have to give it a minute to kick in," Ryan snapped, and Summer was so relieved to hear him respond to something that she decided to let his tone of voice slide, just this once.
"The deputy said that it's not too far to the courthouse," she ventured.
Ryan grunted his response. Great. She was going to have to start driving in first gear all the way in order to piss him off enough to get him to respond again.
Deputy Hansen had been true to his word, and the courthouse was not very far at all. Of course, by the time that they got there, and found a parking space, and found the front door, Ryan had smoked two more cigarettes and was looking faintly green.
There was a low wooden bench by the inside door, and she steered him towards it.
"Just sit here a minute," she ordered, "And give me back those cigarettes, you addict. You're gonna give yourself lung cancer before the day is through."
Ryan looked for a moment like he was going to protest, but she held out her hand impatiently, and he finally complied with a sigh.
"We should go," he said suddenly, catching a glance at the large clock that dominated the inner foyer, "We have to find out where she's being arraigned."
He was showing more animation than he had back at the station, but there was still something off about his responses.
She made a quick decision.
"You don't look so good," she said.
He looked at her before running a hand over his tired, stubbled face.
"It's been a long day," he answered.
"Well, you have to make a good impression on the judge, or whatever, don't you? Why don't you go clean up a little, and I'll find the lawyer guy, and figure out where we have to be," she said firmly.
Whether it was a measure of either his genuine exhaustion, or another symptom of his strange behavior, Summer couldn't be sure, but he simply nodded and refused to argue further.
"Fine," he said after a minute, "I'll find a men's room and meet you back here in a couple minutes."
Summer stopped him before he could get up, rummaging through her purse. For once, she was glad that she had her everyday bag, and hadn't had a chance to exchange it for something more in line with her stealth sneaking-out outfit.
She gave a triumphant laugh as she found the small, leather pouch at the bottom of her bag.
"Ha. I knew it."
Ordinarily, she would have tossed it to him, and he would have caught it easily, but today, she wasn't sure he'd even realize she was hurling a projectile towards him. Instead, she pressed it against his chest.
"Here."
"What is this?" he asked, sounding, despite everything, faintly amused. "I don't think lip gloss is really going to help."
She resisted the urge to stick out her tongue at him.
"No lip gloss. Disposable razor, one of those toothbrush mini-thingies, maybe some mouthwash. A comb," she added pointedly.
"Do I even want to know why?" he asked as he unzipped the small case to confirm her inventory.
"Duh. It's for Daddy. Sometimes he gets called in when we're out places, and sometimes we don't have his car with his stuff in it. It's, like, for medical emergencies."
Ryan held up a pale blue mini-tube to the light.
"Kiehl's Close Shavers Blue Eagle Shave Cream is for medical emergencies? I'd have gone with band-aids, myself."
His mouth smiled for a moment, then he stood, suddenly taller than her again.
"Thanks, Summer. I'll, uh, be back soon."
She nodded, and waited until he disappeared around the corner at the end of the corridor to make her own way into the courthouse proper.
Quickly, she made her way to the Help Desk.
"Can you tell me where I can find Pat Rafferty?" she asked politely. The older man in a uniform that looked something like the deputy's, only in a forest green, looked up from his racing form at her. It appeared that the courthouse wasn't exactly jumping on a Saturday morning.
"The public defender?"
"Um, yeah, I guess so," she said. That was what Sandy Cohen had been, right? A free lawyer for poor people, like Ryan, like his mother.
"He's down the hall to the left there; going over the call of the list in one of the conference rooms. Court's gonna start in about fifteen minutes, though," the man added absently.
Summer nodded her thanks, but he had already returned his attention to the page. She followed his vague directions down the hall, but lucked out when only one conference room gave any indication of being occupied.
Hoping that Ryan was a slow, careful shaver, she knocked on the frosted-glass door, but didn't bother to wait for a response.
She entered, startling the two middle-aged men who sat at the conference table, a pile of already-battered manila folders in front of them. How was that even possible? Weren't these new cases?
One of the men had silver hair and wore a navy blazer over a pressed white shirt and striped tie. The other had dark brown hair shot with strands of grey. He wore a rumpled khaki jacket over a blue oxford shirt and a kelly-green knit tie. It didn't take a genius to guess which of the two lawyers was Pat Rafferty.
"Hi," she said, suddenly nervous, "Mr., um, Rafferty -- Esquire?" she added, just in case.
Right on the money. The guy with the bad tie nodded and sort of raised his hand in greeting.
"Can I help you?" he asked.
"Um, yeah. Do you have, like, a minute? I need to talk to you before you go into court," she said.
"Are you a client?" he asked, rifling through the small pile directly in front of him. "Because we'll have a moment to consult before the arraignment."
"Not exactly," she answered honestly, and he raised his eyes back to her again.
"I'm sorry, who are you?" he asked
Summer sighed in frustration.
"I'm your client's son's kinda foster brother's girlfriend. There, doesn't that just clear everything right up? Can you talk to me or what?" she demanded.
The older guy with the silver hair chuckled softly.
"She has a point, Pat," he said. Summer decided she liked him. Snappy dressers were smarter, apparently. No big surprise there.
"Very well. If you'll excuse me for a minute, Charles, I'm going to talk to -- whoever this is," the rumpled guy said with an indulgent smile.
She took a deep breath and reminded herself that she was doing this for Ryan.
"Summer Roberts," she said brightly, in her best Harbor School sing-song voice. "Thanks so much."
She sat down in one of the chairs across from the men and stared pointedly at the older lawyer, who simply smiled back at her, before gathering up several files.
"I'll just step outside while you two talk, then, shall I?" he said. "I need to make a few calls anyway."
With that, he gathered up his sleek, black leather case and walked out, leaving Summer sitting more or less across from the public defender.
"What can I do for you, Miss Roberts?" he asked, gesturing at the mound of papers that still surrounded him. "As you can see, we're on kind of a tight deadline."
She nodded, suddenly nervous again, and put her purse down on the table next to her, so she couldn't fidget with the clasp.
"I'm here about Dawn Atwood," she said, "But we have to talk fast."
"Dawn Atwood? Oh, yes, Mr. Meehan and I were just about to discuss her case," he said, looking relieved to have recognized the name, and pawing through his folders again.
"Yes, here she is -- oh -- this is going to be a little more complicated than we thought," he said suddenly, after perusing the top sheet of the file. "Who are you again?"
"It doesn't matter," she said quickly. Ryan was going to be searching for them any minute now. She smiled widely at the man. "I mean, I'm not really a part of this. Except, I am. Deputy Hansen sent me," she finally said.
Rafferty nodded, and continued to thumb through Dawn's folder.
"Jim Hansen? He sent you? What's the old dog want?" he asked with half his attention.
"I'm a friend of Ryan's. Ryan Atwood," she said.
"The minor child who no longer resides with my client?" Rafferty half-read the information from a page in the file in front of him.
"Um, yeah, I guess. Anyway, Deputy Hansen said that since she was just, like, a skanky drug addict and not actually, you know, really a dealer, you might be able to make a deal if we can -- you know -- get her into rehab," she said.
The lawyer nodded again, then closed the folder to concentrate his attention on her. For the first time, she could see that his faded green eyes looked kind.
"That's theoretically true, Miss Roberts. In reality, though . . . ."
She cut him off before he could continue.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. No money, no bed. We got the whole spiel. The thing is, we've got the money, or at least, I do. But you've got to set it up and make it look like a charity thing."
The lawyer blinked at her.
"Come again?" he said. "You're what, sixteen, seventeen?"
"Seventeen," she said. "But I'm from Newport Beach," she added, as if that explained everything.
Rafferty nodded again.
"I see."
"Do you?" she asked, relieved.
He rolled his eyes.
"No, actually, I don't. Not at all Look, I appreciate that you want to help your boyfriend's kinda foster brother's mother but . . . "
Summer cut him off again, deciding to lay all her cards on the table.
"Okay, so, I get that this is weird, but here's the deal. Ryan and I just drove, like, a hundred hours to get here because his stupid, skanky mother called him -- after she hadn't seen him for almost two years. His foster parents, or kinda foster parents, or whatever they are--not important--anyway, they would totally be all over this, except he won't tell them anything about it. He thinks that he'd owe them too much if they helped out his mother."
She reached over and started to fiddle with the clasp of her purse.
"Anyway, he thinks he's got to, like, save the whole world. And sometimes you can't, or you can't without help, but he's a boy and he doesn't get it, and it's not fair that he runs all the way here just because she calls him or whatever. He needs to fix this, or she's going to just mess him up all over again. And he won't let me help. So you have to let me help, but you can't tell him about it," she spat out all in one breath.
Rafferty was fingering the edges of the folder again, still looking confused.
"Just -- walk me through this one more time," he asked.
She sighed.
"Here's the deal. Ryan wants to put his mom in rehab. The sheriff guy said she can go to rehab. No one can pay for it except me, but Ryan won't let me. I just need you to do," -- she waved her arms around in an ambiguous gesture -- "Whatever it is you do to make it okay for her to go to rehab instead of jail. Then, you tell me, I put it on my credit card, and you tell Ryan that a miraculous charity bed opened and everyone's all happy," she said. "It's not illegal. It's not even wrong. It's just -- easier."
The lawyer had already started shuffling through his papers as she spoke.
"What kind of facility were you thinking?" he asked.
Summer shrugged. She did have Daddy's black card for emergencies.
"Whatever. As long as we can do it today. It doesn't even have to be, like, the discount rehab."
"And her family thinks she'd be a good candidate for rehabilitation?" he asked absently.
Her family, at least the part of it that wasn't actually an active or an ex-felon, was probably wandering the halls by now, ready to kill her.
"Her family is a kid my age who just drove across California to make sure that his nasty-assed crack ho' of a mother doesn't go to prison like every single other member of his stupid family. I don't care if she's a good candidate or not. If Ryan thinks she is, she is."
God, who -- except maybe Ryan -- cared in the slightest what this skank did or did not want. Not that it mattered much anyway, since Summer was fairly certain that, given the choice, Dawn would jump at the chance to bypass prison for a 12-week stint in a step-monster level detox, complete with 300-thread-count sheets and freshly-squeezed fruit juice each morning
The lawyer looked up at her again with something approaching respect in his eyes.
"Fair enough. Let me bring Mr. Meehan back in here and we'll see if we can't work something out. It will all have to be above-board and in perfect order for the court, but I don't think we need to share all the details with Mrs. Atwood's son, do you?"
Summer almost shouted with relief.
"Excellent. I'm just going to go find Ryan, now, before he comes looking for me. Is there -- do you think he could see her before she goes?" she asked, as she got up, her legs peeling off the sticky, leather chair.
"He'll see her in the courtroom. We'll see what we can work out. I'll find you after the proceedings, Miss Roberts, and give you the pertinent information," he said with a smile as he stuck out his hand.
Faintly, in the background, she could hear Ryan's voice growing more impatient as he called out her name down the hall.
"Great, terrific," she said, as she dropped his hand and started towards the door.
"And, Miss Roberts--for the record?" Rafferty called out before she could escape. She stopped with one hand still on the door and half-turned towards him.
"What?" she snapped, but he merely smiled back at her.
"You're a very good friend," he said.
"Whatever, If Chino catches me in here with you, I'm going to be a very dead friend, so see you later, okay?"
She darted back out into the hallway, slipping the door shut quietly behind her, just in time to see the back of Ryan's shirt disappear around the corner. She made her way back towards the ladies' room, and paused outside its door, raising her voice slightly as she called out his name.
"Ryan? Chino? Where are you?" she called. A moment later, he reappeared.
"Where have you been?" he demanded angrily. "We've got to be in court in a few minutes."
"I found the public defender. He's going to meet with your mom before court, and then meet with us after. He said he thought that they'd be able to work something out."
"Work what out? Summer, what did you do?" he asked.
"Nothing. I just found the lawyer, that's all." She might not have been the proficient liar Cohen was, but she could hold her own when it counted.